If you had asked me two or three years ago about how much to charge delegates for an event it was usually a fair rule of thumb that for a smaller 2 – 3 hour workshop or seminar that £50 or so was a good starting point if your target audience was the micro business market. If you were aiming your event at the corporate market £150 was a starter for 10……but along came austerity and killed that head on!

Then everyone wanted everything for next to nothing and sadly there are were (and are) many people vying for event patronage now that free became the buzz word. I started to see top notch quality events with world class speakers which would normally have attracted a good ticket price crumple until the last minute price reductions or ‘complimentary tickets’ come into play.

Delegates became savvy now and got into the habit of waiting till the last minute to book – deep discounts can be had for many events.

So how do you get the price right for 2014. I am advising clients now when creating events to examine exactly why they are putting them on. If the answer is to ‘make money’ then I suggest going back to the drawing board. If the answer is to promote or upsell a product or service then look at the event as part of the marketing strategy and budget for free ticket price. ……..then work backwards to see if there are any points with the event that justify a charge. Maybe make the initial event a shorter affair with the plan to wow the attendees and upsell the main event afterwards.

But it is like most things nowadays, we all have to work so much harder for our cash and no where more so than when staging events.